lf--go
'long! Shoo!"

The boys went.

At eight, Dick Harrington made his way to the Study to ask the Senior
Master whether boys "on probe" could join the triumphal procession. The
Senior Master was kindly, but firm.

"Sorry, old man," he said. "Probe rules hold."

That was all. But Dick Harrington without a word went to his room on the
third floor of the East Wing, stumbling on the stairs, because of the
tears.

_Why_, he asked himself bitterly again and again--_why hadn't he lied?_

He crept out of his room an hour later, hearing the cheers of the
returning revelers. His hallway was utterly deserted, the school was
deserted. If he needed any further evidence that virtue did not pay,
here it was. "_Be good and you'll be lonesome._" There was one aphorism
proved, at least.

* * * * *

Suddenly, standing in the Quadrangle, he heard singing. Then through the
bare branches he saw the glow of many torches. It was all magical and
mysterious, for the wild cheering which had brought him down from his
room had given way to a solemn exaltation of triumph. If he had had a
hat on his head, he would have pulled it off, hearing the school song
sung that way. He felt a tug at his heart and again the dimness covered
his eyes because he should be fated to have no active part in that
thrilling chorus of victory.

He stood quite still, swallowing hard. At the end of the first stanza,
there was a "regular yell" for The Towers, as the procession turned
sharply, with torches flaring, up the steep drive. He could see now that
they were dragging a hay-wagon with ropes. The team was on the
hay-wagon. The second stanza of the school song floated up to him, it
seemed a chant drifting over from fairyland.

The procession came nearer now. The hill and the hay-wagon together
proved too much for the singers and the song died off in breathless
laughter and another cheer. Then somebody started to call off the score:
"One--two--three--four--" to a climactic burst--"Fifteen!" The
procession disappeared behind the Main Building only to reappear a
minute or two later around the corner of the Office, on the other side
of the Archway. Dick Harrington wished that he had enough manly pride to
scorn it all and go back to his room. But he didn't, so he rushed to
where the crowd was gathered and listened in rapture to the cheers and
the speeches and the songs and all the wonderful stories of a wonderful
game.

"Colon